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RAVINIA’S STEANS MUSIC INSTITUTE
Over the past year, RSMI has said goodbye to some outstanding figures from its formation
and growth. The impact they’ve left on the music world, and especially the legacy of RSMI, is
immeasurable, and the loss of their presence will be deeply felt for years to come.
Founder a
nd first artistic director of the Ravinia’s Steans Music Institute,
Robert Mann
passed
away on January 1, 2018. Mann was a violinist, a composer, a conductor, and a founding member
of the Juilliard String Quartet. Working with Edward Gordon (1930-96), Mann assisted with
launching the young professional training program that became Ravinia’s Steans Music Institute.
Under the artistic direction of Mann, the institute’s inaugural 1988 season comprised a five-week
program for piano, violin, viola, and cello. From the beginning, Mann ensured that the institute
wasn’t simply a school with students and teachers, but a shared institution of discovery with intense
focus and collaboration between young artists and faculty members.
Renowned violinist
Walter Levin
passed away August 7, 2017, at the age of 92. Levin, who was a
founding member of the LaSalle Quartet, was one of the original faculty members of Ravinia’s Steans
Music Institute in 1988, and served as chairman of the faculty from 1989 to 1993. Throughout his
time as a faculty member of Ravinia’s Steans Music Institute, Levin coached and mentored countless
students. He took an extensive coaching role with the Ariel Quartet, the institute’s quartet-in-
residence in 2006, spending a year with them in Switzerland for in-depth studies.
Under Levin’s leadership, RSMI established an international reputation that has grown with the
institute’s history and size. He assisted in creating performance opportunities with the introduction of
a system to combine the participants of the institute into small ensembles for chamber music.
Saxophonist and composer
Nathan Davis
, one
of the original members of the Program for
Jazz faculty, passed away on April 8, 2018, at the age of 81. Having grown up in Kansas City,
Davis performed in jazz groups all over the world, spending an especially formative portion of
his career in Paris, France. In his 70-plus year career, Davis played alongside Art Blakey, Ray
Charles, and Eric Dolphy, among countless others. For 44 years, Davis ran the jazz program at
the University of Pittsburgh, growing it from a small program into the thriving and well-regarded
program it is today, including founding the first academic jazz event of its kind, the University of
Pittsburgh Annual Jazz Seminar and Concert.
Davis was the recipient of the Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation’s BNY Mellon Jazz Living Legacy
Award at the Kennedy Center in 2013, and in 2015 he was named a co-program director of
Ravinia’s Steans Music Institute’s Program for Jazz, where he had been a faculty member since
the program’s inception in 2000. Davis’s contributions to the institute were invaluable, from his
musical insights to his talents as a composer, to the historical appreciation he passed down to the
next generation of jazz musicians. His passion for jazz was evident in all he did, but never more so than when he was teaching and working with the
jazz fellows of Ravinia’s Steans Music Institute.
Violinist and violist
Michael Tree
, who served as a viola faculty member at RSMI in 1997,
died of Parkinson’s Disease on March 30, 2018, at the age of 84. His debut at Carnegie Hall
at the age of 20 launched him into a successful career as a soloist who collaborated with
some of the world’s most famous orchestras, including the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, and the Philadelphia Orchestra. He was a founding member
of the Marlboro Trio and Guarneri Quartet, and was a faculty member at Curtis Institute of
Music, The Juilliard School, Manhattan School of Music, Bard College Conservatory, and
the Marlboro Music School and Festival in addition to the summer he spent at RSMI.
Michael
Tree
RSMI
MEMORIAM
RSMI Says Goodbye to Faculty Members and Founding Fathers
Robert Mann
Walter Levin
with RSMI
faculty member
Leon Fleisher
Nathan
Davis